I am fixing up an old Rockhopper for my commuter and have a question about the older STI front shifter. It works good except for the fact that when I want to go from the big ring to the middle ring it will snap all the way down to the granny. Going up works great and trims up nicely, but going from the big down to the little than having to go back to the middle is a pain. Is there a fix? I am thinking about removing the small ring and adjusting the low stop to fix the problem. But I am going to wait untill I ride it to make sure I can climb some of the steep hills. The bike is heaver than my roadie and the hills are tough with it. I am waiting on some slicks and brake cable and I will be ready to ride.

I bet the ratchet is hanging up just enough to miss the stop on the down shift. Use some spray cleaner, I like carb cleaner, and jet it in thru any hole. Then action the shifter a bunch and it should start working, then lube it with some light oil. If you can see the ratchet or are willing to disasemble it enough to get to the ratchet, you can spray it directly and then work it back and forth with a small screwdriver to free it up.
If it turns out to be broken, you can still get 7speed shift pods pretty cheap.